James Gurney

This daily weblog by Dinotopia creator James Gurney is for illustrators, plein-air painters, sketchers, comic artists, animators, art students, and writers. You'll find practical studio tips, insights into the making of the Dinotopia books, and first-hand reports from art schools and museums.

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or by email:gurneyjourney (at) gmail.comSorry, I can't give personal art advice or portfolio reviews. If you can, it's best to ask art questions in the blog comments.

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All images and text are copyright 2015 James Gurney and/or their respective owners. Dinotopia is a registered trademark of James Gurney. For use of text or images in traditional print media or for any commercial licensing rights, please email me for permission.

However, you can quote images or text without asking permission on your educational or non-commercial blog, website, or Facebook page as long as you give me credit and provide a link back. Students and teachers can also quote images or text for their non-commercial school activity. It's also OK to do an artistic copy of my paintings as a study exercise without asking permission.

Monday, May 2, 2011

Over at the farm yesterday, Lenny harnessed up the Belgian draft horses. He wanted to give them some practice with ground driving.

Even the miniature horse Skye was in harness. She’s pregnant. A baby miniature foal is due in the next few days. I’ll try to do some sketches when the day comes.

Lenny let me try ground driving behind Sofie and Abby. It’s the first time I’ve tried it. He told me to lean back a bit to let them know I was behind them.

I was pretending I was walking behind a couple of Anchiceratops, like in Dinotopia: Journey to Chandara.
The other news is that on Saturday night a big black bear came right up to the back of our house. I think he smelled the bird feeders. It's the first black bear I've ever seen on this side of the Hudson River.

Soon it will be time to close up the feeders for the season, but there have been some spectacular birds passing through, such as my favorite, the rose breasted grosbeak, a bird we see only one day a year.

Belgians will stamp their feet, when one tries to control them.If you want to go left, they'll go right. And when they feel like stopping they'll just stop.And when they notice that you're starting to get a bit enervated and irritated with it all, you may even catch them grinning and grinding their teeth with sarcastic joy.

Dear James,In Montauban, France, it is not the bears which come to town but the wild pigs (Sanglier in french) making happy Obelix from Asterix comic strip. I think the message our Sangliers are telling us : you mankind are invading too much our countries, please make a place for every living specy. Carol

We had a black bear demolish our feeder (Amherst). He stood there a long time, leaning against a tree, digging his claws into the plastic, and licking up the seeds that fell out until it was drained. He stood there a good long time, I got some great footage and a couple sketches out of it.

I know this is an old post, but your "one day" comment about the grosbeaks intrigued me. I have seen a rose breasted grosbeak here in VA twice, on two different days in two different years. I guess they don't like to tarry on their way north in the Spring!